


The Reality of Promotion

by AMarguerite



Series: A Monstrous Regiment [9]
Category: Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen, Temeraire - Naomi Novik
Genre: 19th century methods of embalming, Battle, Character Death In Dream, Gen, character stabbed through the lung, let me know if I ought to take anything else, the major character death is an OC just to clarify
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-21
Updated: 2019-04-21
Packaged: 2020-01-23 14:38:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18551791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AMarguerite/pseuds/AMarguerite
Summary: Lizzy unexpectedly becomes captain of His Majesty's Dragon Wollstonecraft during the French invasion of Britain.





	The Reality of Promotion

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MissGolding](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissGolding/gifts).



“You’re needed at Dover,” said Captain Roland, bleakly. Under the miasma of gunpowder smoke she was pale. 

“At Dover?” Lizzy repeated. 

It wasn’t that she didn’t understand, for Lizzy had guessed at the contents of the letter when Captain Roland had looked up from the paper and stared straight at Lizzy. Captain Roland’s bleakness had only confirmed it. This was the news Lizzy had resolutely refused to think about all her life; the thing she knew must happen if she was to take her proper place in the world, and yet the thing she most dreaded.

“Yes. The French have crossed the channel. Your aunt’s division….” Captain Roland stepped closer, and put a hand on Lizzy’s shoulder. “There’s no easy way to say this. They engaged in battle and… and were overpowered.”

They were on Excedium’s back; one of the couriers was struggling to keep pace at the Longwing’s shoulder, and was anxiously filling in Excidium on the situation at Dover. Snatches of this news hit Lizzy like grapeshot. The French crossed the Channel— overwhelmed by a superior force— numbers not what they had been because of the plague— battle, a very bloody one—

Captain Roland had been quiet so long Lizzy could not bear it any longer. She tried for a joke. “Say it plain soldier. That’s what we are.”

“Aye, true enough.” But this did not help. Behind her goggles, Captain Roland’s eyes were full of tears.

Lizzy forced herself to say, “The French killed the division, haven’t they?”

Captain Roland looked a little relieved. She lifted her goggles and tipped out the tears, drying her eyes on the back of her glove. “It’s not as bad as that, though it’s ghastly. A French aviator stabbed your Aunt Bess through the lung. Wollstonecraft landed immediately at the covert so that she could be seen to. The rest of the division is still fighting, but it’s looking damn bad for them and for your aunt.”

Lizzy gripped the pommel of her sword until it bit into her hand. She felt as if she had been stabbed with her aunt. The pain of it was excruciating; Lizzy felt herself shaking. 

Captain Roland tightened her grip on Lizzy’s shoulder. “You’re needed. Captain Hopkins is here with Cressida, they’ll take you to Dover.” Captain Roland unhooked Lizzy’s carbineers. “Come on.”

Lizzy tried to move but her legs did not want to hold her weight; she staggered into Captain Roland. 

Captain Roland signaled to Freddy; he grasped the guide ropes and pulled himself hand over hand towards them. God bless Freddy. He took a look at the two of them and said, quietly, “We’ll help you, Lizzy. I know it is useless to tell you not to worry—“

“She could recover?” Captain Roland offered, with obvious uncertainty.

Lizzy said, hearing and hating the edge of tearful hysteria in her voice, “No. No, don’t, please. I know this is it. I know they have killed her. A sword to the lung?  That cannot be recovered from.”

Freddy had taken one of Lizzy’s arms, and Captain Roland the other. He sounded lost as he murmured, “That’s it. One foot before the other. To Cressida. Come now. Lizzy, you’ve trained your whole life for this.”

“I thought I had more time,” said Lizzy. She felt young and weak and helpless with misery. 

“Wollstonecraft will help you,” said Captain Roland. “Ask her advice.”

Somehow they were before Cressida. Captain Hopkins moved her closer, so that Lizzy had only to step down onto Cressida. Yet her fingers would not work; she could not hook in. Captain Hopkins had to do it for her.

Captain Roland said, “None of us ever feels ready for the epaulettes, Bennet. But believe me, you are. You’ve learnt from the best.”

Lizzy tried to laugh but as soon as Cressida peeled away, she found herself trying to stifle sobs.

“Wind’s strong today,” Captain Hopkins yelled over his shoulder, with rough sympathy. “You’ll have to shout if you need anything. I’m deaf to everything else.”

This kindness was too much. Lizzy pushed up her goggles and cried into her gloved hands. Death in battle had always been a constant possibility— but a possibility. Never a certainty. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Aunt Bess wasn’t supposed to die when Lizzy was eighteen and had only been a lieutenant for two years. Aunt Bess wasn’t supposed to die at all. She still had an aspect of godlike invulnerability to Lizzy. Aunt Bess was so strong, so skilled, so formidable— how could anyone get the better of her?

But someone had.

When Cressida landed at the Dover covert, Lizzy tumbled off her to see her aunt staggering towards them.

Aunt Bess was only in trousers and boots, with heavy bandages about her chest. Officers and doctors were crowding about her, frantic. Wollstonecraft was close behind, head so low her tusks skimmed the dirt. 

Lizzy somehow made her knees work, and rushed over, catching her aunt just before she fell. 

“Aunt Bess,” said Lizzy, feeling herself start to cry again. “Oh Aunt Bess, you ought to rest, surely?”

“Too much to do,” said Aunt Bess, gripping Lizzy tight. Her voice came out in painful-sounding wheezes. 

“Captain Gardiner, please,” said a man in a bloody apron. “You must rest.”

“You did your best, doc,” said Aunt Bess, with a grim smile. “I know you did. It’s alright.”

“How can it be alright?” Lieutenant Alleyene asked, tears streaming down his face. 

“Lizzy’s here.” Aunt Bess looked up at Lizzy with what Lizzy could not help but feel was misplaced confidence. “Don’t cry Lieutenant. I’ve taught her well... and so has...  Admiral Roland. I’ll be... damned glad... to be out of this pain.” 

“I’m here,” said Lizzy, with a false show of cheer. “I’m here, Aunt Bess.”

“I’m damned sorry Lizzy,” she said. “I thought you'd have... twenty years more... to learn your trade. But God bless you... for starting now.” Her voice had faded away almost to nothing, towards the end. 

The people around them scattered; Lizzy looked up to see Wollstonecraft immediately before them. 

“Oh my girl,” said Aunt Bess, weakly raising a hand to the dragon.

Lizzy gently leaned her aunt against Wollstonecraft’s nose. 

“Bess,” said Wollstonecraft, in accents of such grief Lizzy had to screw up her face to keep from sobbing.

“I love you,” said Aunt Bess, wearily, scratchily. “I did my best by you… and you by me. Lizzy... will now. Look after her. She’ll… need your help.”

“I will,” said Wollstonecraft. 

Aunt Bess hugged Wollstonecraft’s snout. “My dearest. Don’t like… to leave you… but Lizzy… good egg.”

Then in a sudden burst of energy, Aunt Bess half turned, raised her left hand, and grabbed Lizzy’s sleeve. Her voice was faint, but her look intense as she said, “Everything… is yours… except… money, in the Funds. For Hetty Kemble. And this.” She raised her right hand, the ring finger a little extended. On it she wore a ring popular in the 1790s, a lover’s eye painted on a small oval of porcelain, set on top of a gold band. Lizzy recognized the mild gray gaze of the Drury Lane actress Henrietta “Hetty” Kemble. Aunt Bess had always referred to Hetty as her wife, jokingly among aviators, and seriously to Lizzy. “See... she gets it. And… return… her letters.”

“I will give them to her in person,” said Lizzy, grasping her aunt’s right hand. “I will make sure she wants for nothing, I promise you.”

“She’s… richer… than me,” said Aunt Bess, amused. “But—“ pressing Lizzy’s hand and releasing it “—you’re… good girl.” Aunt Bess turned her head, wheezing, “Coat.”

Second lieutenant Lucas quietly came forward and draped a uniform coat over Aunt Bess’s shoulders. Aunt Bess shook her head a little, sinking against Wollstonecraft’s snout. Her legs seemed to have given out on her. If Aunt Bess hadn’t been draped over Wollstonecraft’s snout, she would have been on the ground. Aunt Bess raised a shaking hand to the epaulettes of her coat.

Lieutenant Lucas understood much quicker than Lizzy; she took out a dagger from her boot and cut at the stitching holding the epaulettes into the shoulders of Aunt Bess’s coat. 

“I need pins!” Lieutenant Lucas called. “Needle and thread! But pins first.” She looked at Lizzy. Her eyes were red-rimmed. “Take off your flying coat, Lieutenant Bennet.”

Lizzy fumbled her flying coat off and let it fall to the ground.

Someone rushed forward with pins, as Lieutenant Lucas guided Aunt Bess’s hand, curling her fingers around the gold braid.

“Help me,” said Aunt Bess, her voice so faint Lizzy thought she had imagined it. 

They all did. Wollstonecraft nudged Aunt Bess a little more upright, a little closer to Lizzy; Lizzy leaned forward and down, so that Aunt Bess had only to drop her hand to clap the epaulette on Lizzy’s shoulder; Lieutenant Lucas guided her hand and pinned the epaulette in place.

Aunt Bess’s each, labored breath sounded as if it had been extracted from her, at great effort, and yet she clung on until she placed the second epaulette to Lizzy’s shoulder. There was blood at her lips when she said, “Captain... Bennet… of Wollstonecraft.”

Wollstonecraft made a sad, low, keening noise that rattled through them both. 

Lizzy raised a shaking hand in a salute. “Reporting for duty.”

At last, Aunt Bess smiled and leaned forward to rest her head against Lizzy’s new epaulettes. Lizzy felt as if her legs could not hold them both up, and when Aunt Bess stopped breathing, and Lizzy could no longer stand, she found Wollstonecraft’s nose at her side, and Wollstonecraft’s forelegs about them both. All that Aunt Bess had placed on her shoulders weighed so heavily upon her. Lizzy did not know how she could fly— how she could do anything really. 

The noise of battle had been a distant constant, in the background, but was steadily growing louder. Lieutenant Lucas said, from the other side of Wollstonecraft’s arm, “Captain Bennet. There is a courier from London. The Admiralty has told us to abandon Dover and fall back on London.” 

Oh God. She was the division captain. It was her job to convey the order, to figure out how this was to be accomplished. 

Wollstonecraft disconsolately nosed at both her and Aunt Bess. 

“Wollstonecraft.” Her voice did not sound like her own. Lizzy cleared her throat, started again. “Wollstonecraft.”

“Yes, Lizzy,” said Wollstonecraft, subdued. 

“We’ll need too— we must take her to London. For burial.” Her voice broke. Lizzy hated the sound of it. But Wollstonecraft slowly dragged her forearm away; several of Aunt Bess’s officers bore the body away. Lizzy watched them go. Lieutenant Lucas remained by her. 

“Where’s the first lieutenant?” asked Lizzy, eyes fixed on the group conveying her aunt a little ways distant, towards a waiting brandy barrel. This was the standard method of transporting a body to its final resting place. Lizzy had often seen it. Why did it strike her now as so strange, so obscene?

Lieutenant Lucas said, quietly, “He was shot at the start of the battle. It is only me and Alleyene now, of the lieutenants.” 

Lizzy at last tore her eyes away. “First lieutenant Lucas.”

“Yes captain?”

It jolted her unpleasantly, to be a captain, but the epaulettes were on her shoulders. She felt their full weight. “Tell everyone around the covert to burn their papers, anything that could— that if they fell into the hands of the enemy—”

“Aye, aye, captain.”

“Wait,” said Lizzy, putting her hand to Charlotte’s arm. “I... I—”

“That is a good first order,” said Wollstonecraft unexpectedly. “Perhaps Lieutenant Lucas might also tell everyone to prepare for immediate departure. It is only me and the couriers on the ground. The rest of the division is aloft and will have to fly off at once. We will not be able to manage most personal effects; priority should go to ammunition and provisions.” 

“Yes,” said Lizzy, leaning gratefully on Wollstonecraft.“Yes, but Lieutenant Lucas, please be sure to bring my aunt’s traveling writing desk to me. I have promises to keep.”

Lieutenant Lucas nodded. 

“Shall I make ready?” Wollstonecraft hinted, once Lieutenant Lucas had departed.

Lizzy took a moment more to accustom herself to her epaulettes, to her responsibilities, to her new position. 

She told herself, ‘You have been raised to this.’

She tried to imagine herself in the captain’s place, at Wollstonecraft’s neck.

She felt Wollstonecraft’s breath streaming out about her, on each side, like elevating gusts of wind.

“Yes,” said Lizzy, opening her eyes, and picking her flying coat off the ground. “Make ready. We must leave as soon as we possibly can. Once we are in the air, we will signal to the rest of the division that we are to fall back to London.”

Wollstonecraft said, “Aye, aye, captain.”   


End file.
